My favorite living actor. 6 entertaining CDs of memories and taking stock in that warm, familiar Cockney voice.
Caine had been this way before in 2 previous autobios, but this one offers much life advice mixed in with the movie and star memories.
The opening CDs cover his early days and his ignoble starts blowing lines and repeatedly falling off an ornery horse in Zulu. He looks back at his past as a study in survival, surviving what he calls “knock-backs”, and taking advantage of “opportunities” afforded by errors. As he common-sensibly puts it, he always looked for positives in his failures and never made the same mistake twice.
Caine has long been a dedicated craftsman, giving 100% to each role, and, even if he hadn’t ‘made it’ he still would have pursued a long-term acting career. Later, he outlines his priorities in picking scripts with artfulness at the top and the money-makers (e.g., to buy a home for his mother) at the bottom. As he repeatedly remarks, some practical good came out of every flop and disaster.
He spends some time analyzing Zulu, his first hit Alfie, and The Ipcress File–all which made him a star. Many times before those movies, he was told by directors and producers (people like Otto Preminger) to get out of acting and that would never become a star. Caine persevered despite all these soul-destroying recommendations and proved his early critics wrong.
His favorite actors and directors were John Huston, Humphrey Bogart, and Chris Nolan (the latter who came to house one morning o offer him the part of Alfred, Batman’s butler). The favorite movies he made include Alfie, The Man Who Would Be King, The Quiet American, Sleuth, and Educating Rita. The best early advice Caine got was from John Wayne, who–because of his own experience in a washroom when a fellow urinal patron turned to chat him up and peed on Wayne’s suede shoes–cautioned Caine never to wear suede shoes. Such are the odd, unexpected, amusing anecdotes that slide into the narrative from time to time.
Caine’s main regret on roles not played was the movie The Dresser. He memorably turned down Hitchcock who wanted him for the Barry Foster Cockney psychopath role in Frenzy. After that, Hitch snubbed him whenever Caine greeted him in public. There are many insights like this into difficult people in the industry.
His participation in remakes seldom worked except in Dirty, Rotten Scoundrels, a remake of the Brando-Niven bomb Bedtime Story. Interestingly, Caine never learned to drive until he was 50. Of aging, he says he feels ageless and has opted to keep on working in film. His most recent role was last year at age 88. (Since this audiobook, Caine says he has retired from films and turned more to writing.)
His views on death and his personal reactions to death are quite interesting, culminating with an anecdote about a visit to his dying friend John Huston, who told him to get the hell out and go have a good time; advice which he is still adhering to at age 85, as the book ends.
Highly recommended for anyone who is a Caine fan, for anyone who wants to know about how difficult an acting career can be, for anyone who remembers English culture from the ’50s to ’70s, and for anyone who is looking for valuable life lessons from one of the most popular, likable actors of the last 60 years.